Old link, but I hadn’t realized the caveat until today. Basically, most of the waste that’s accumulated in the GPGP is from industrial scale fishing (US, China, etc). I’ve long known that it isn’t a big island (you can’t even photograph it; it’s just slightly murky water for miles and miles), but for some reason I thought this implied that most oceanic waste is fishing related. That’s not right, see the wikipedia page.
Stop eating fish and continue sharing information is a good start while you push for industrial change.
I stopped eating fish years ago because of that and still support their message. Companies like Coca-Cola love personal responsibility and little ocean cleaning projects because they give people the illusion that the industry doesn‘t have to change. Change is only possible with policies that directly target their profits, though. That also goes for fishing and for that you would have to violently sink shadow fishing fleets probably. Which is especially tragic since many of them are manned by slaves but what else can you do?
My fish consumption has dropped dramatically since learning of this info (can’t cut it out entirely…be we try) and I do indeed spread the info as naturally as I can. So, agreed! It is indeed a great start.